Central American Mammals

Abstract

THREE years ago the author of these volumes published, in the same serial, a valuable synopsis of the mammals of North America and the adjacent seas. In the present, larger work he has taken in hand the mammals of the tract generally known in this country as Central America, but on the other side of the Atlantic termed, at any rate by zoologists, Middle America, together with those of the West Indian islands. The greater bulk of the present work is accounted for, not so much by the greater number of species (690 against 606) as by the increased elaboration of the mode of treatment, the addition of diagnostic “keys” to the various genera, and by a fuller account of the habits of many species, the latter feature rendering these volumes proportionately more valuable to the naturalist, and at the same time of more general interest. The illustrations, too, are more numerous, comprising, besides crania, figures of the external form of a considerable number of species, the addition of the latter likewise tending to popularise the work